Radiant Girl by Andrea White

Author:Andrea White [White, Andrea]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Tags: Radiant Girl
ISBN: 9781933979236
Publisher: Bright Sky Press
Published: 2008-10-01T04:00:00+00:00

“This is Katya Dubko.”

After our exchange of greetings, my gaze turned to her living room. Crystals of all sizes and shapes hung on every available wall, and separated and spread the daylight flowing in from the windows throughout the otherwise ordinary apartment. Even the ceiling was unexpected. Although the green and the pink bands had smeared, an artist had painted an impressive rainbow over the breakfast table.

The way the light filled the room reminded me of my stream. The sunlight and rocks had broken down the clear water into bits of colors similar to those gleaming around me. I stood for a moment enjoying my memories of my forest stream. It had been a long time since I remembered the way the water looked when it had tumbled over the rocks on a sunny day. Too long.

Margarita seemed to notice and approve of my gaze. “I’m so proud,” she said, gesturing at the crystals, “to be healing our damaged land.”

Margarita described her business, Crystal Creations. “I sell three lengths of necklaces with five different auras. The auras promote healing, happiness, wealth, spirituality, and love. Upon receipt of the crystals from a supplier in the U.S., I bless each in a mysterious process and designate its aura.” These ceremonies took place at night after Lyudmila and I had gone home. Following the blessings, the rocks took on light hues: health was green; happiness, violet; wealth, blue; spirituality, yellow; and love, red. The gradations in shade were so slight as to be almost imperceptible.

“Auntie,” Lyudmila’s tone was wheedling. “Katya wants a job.”

Again, Lyudmila was arranging my life without consulting me, but I immediately liked her idea. It was time for me to get a job. I hated asking Papa for money. He never complied without grumbling.

Margarita gestured toward the packages of crystals piled on her breakfast room table. “Katya, you can be my assistant in this noble venture.”

I wasn’t sure about her theories or what she was offering. But I wanted to learn more about the birth defects, see more pictures like the one of the colt. “O.K.,” I agreed.

Margarita slipped a crystal tied on a green ribbon around my neck. It bumped against the silver chain that Papa had given me.

“What’s this for?”

“To guard against radiation. It’s your first week’s pay in advance,” Margarita said. She clapped her hands. “Now, girls, don’t just stand there. We need to get busy.”

“Katya, you can help me,” Lyudmila called from the kitchen counter. It was piled high with order forms, envelopes, plastic baggies, ribbons and crystals of all shapes, sizes and colors.

“Katya, the first thing you must understand is this: my little apartment in Slavutich is doing more to keep us safe than the entire Soviet military industrial complex,” Margarita began.

I sat down eagerly next to Lyudmila. I so wanted to believe.

Two months later, I was still stringing crystal necklaces at Margarita’s. That was long enough for me to earn several prize crystals as wages and to discover that my employer knew very little about the effects of radiation.

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